Sound symbolism in Gooniyandi, a language of Western Australia

Abstract

AbstractIn Gooniyandi, a non-Pama-Nyungan Australian Aboriginal language spoken in the vicinity of Fitzroy Crossing in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, many verb roots end in consonants, unlike roots of other classes, which are almost always vowel final. The distribution of final consonants across the class of verb roots is examined, and it is shown that those ending in the same consonant tend to cluster together into a small number of semantically coherent groups. It is further argued that these associations of final consonants and semantic features of the action are iconically motivated: that is, there is evidence of phonaesthesia in Gooniyandi verbs. Possible articulatory and acoustic bases for this sound-iconicity are proposed and evaluated. For example, final ng is strongly associated with processes which involve hollow or resonant sounds, blunt shapes, or bent things. These associations are likely to be motivated by auditory iconicity (velars are grave acoustically) and/or articulatory ico...